An Appropriation from Free Cash (account 01-324001) to the Planning Department (#175) in the amount of $70,000 to hire a consultant for technical assistance to update the Downtown Parking Study.

Transcript (~17 min @ 5:31:44)

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▶ 5:31:33 Kimberly Vandiver: Good work. Thank you. That will be recommended back to the full council. Next up, we have ID number 2026-1165, an appropriation from free cash account 01-324001 to the planning department, number 175, in the amount of $70,000 to hire a consultant for technical assistance to update the downtown parking study.

▶ 5:31:53 Speaker 14: Okay. Thank you. So we are trying to do more proactive planning, as you can see. So this study that we're hoping to do is a downtown parking study. The city conducted a study in 2012, and with the changes that have happened in the city with development and with changes in the physical parking lots, we think it's a good time to do a new study. There's also the police station site that we are figuring out what the future of that will be, and also the reconfiguration of the city hall parking lot. So, those are two other projects that are happening downtown. And so we are hoping to have this study to look at the inventory, the utilization at different points, to understand if there is a problem or not, and how best to manage parking. It's an important issue for I think a lot of residents and then also our businesses in town. So we received a letter of support from Stephanie Nelson from the Chamber of Commerce. I guess I'll just leave it there and take any questions. Thank you.

▶ 5:33:31 Speaker 10: Thank you. In the queue, I have Councilor Williams followed by President Freeman. Thanks. So

▶ 5:33:37 Ryan Williams: I don't think I can support an effort to try and pack more parking into downtown. The way that you've sort of described it, packaging all these different things, is slightly different. However, I feel like we've appropriated lots of money for the city hall parking lot, and I can't actually remember, at this point I can't remember my own name, but I can't remember what... I just feel like we've put money into this-And that we were just sort of waiting on a big grant to finish it up. I don't know. But the downtown parking study in 2012, I've read it many times. It basically just sort of said when everybody wants to go downtown, it's busy. When people don't want to be downtown, it's not busy. I drive around. I mean, that's what it said, right? I don't know how much money it costs, but that's what it said. It said when a lot of people want to drive downtown, it's busy. And I go downtown sometimes in my car, and I drive around in circles for 20 minutes looking for a place to park. It's life in the city. I go a little further out and a little further out until I find a nice place I can land, and then I walk over. So, I don't know. I worry. Let me ask you a question. Has anybody said to you the words parking garage in the context of this conversation that you've had with people? Whether it's the mayor's office, Stephanie, anybody. Has anybody said to you, "Maybe parking garage?"

▶ 5:35:06 Speaker 14: Oh, no. I mean, we did hear parking garage for the police station site as a- Yeah ... as a request there. I didn't mean to imply that this money was going towards the city hall parking lot. We have money set aside- Yeah. That's what I thought ... for that project. I'm just saying that there's moving pieces of the parking picture. It's more about making sure that we are managing the parking, and I would be surprised if the studies show that we are over capacity. But we do want to know, we do want to have that data. There is a perception that there isn't enough parking downtown. Sure. So we need the data to show if that's true or not, and then how best to manage parking. So, one of the results of the last one was to change the merchant parking program, and- Mm-hmm I think that was a big success.

▶ 5:36:05 Ryan Williams: Yeah, I struggle a bit with the wording in the order to balance the supply and availability of parking spaces. The consultant will provide recommendations for improving the parking supply and availability. All of this says to me more parking downtown, and I just can't.

▶ 5:36:26 Speaker 14: Yeah, sorry. The intention was not for increasing the supply. It's better managing the supply that we have so that there is available parking.

▶ 5:36:34 Ryan Williams: I appreciate that. I don't want to belabor my point because I did certainly well enough on the turf field that it's what it says in the order. I'm going off what it says in the order. The consultant will provide recommendations for improving the parking supply, and I can't vote to fund a study that's sole purpose is to add more cars to downtown because I feel like we're already choked as it is at peak hours.

▶ 5:37:00 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. Thank you. I have several councilors. I have President Freeman, Councilor Cal, Finocchiaro, and Karim Shady.

▶ 5:37:06 Bradley Freeman: Thank you very much. And I do want to note, I think Steph Nelson's letter today was very helpful, as was the reference to what came out of the 2012 study with the merchant parking. I think one big thing that's changed since then, which is why I'm supportive of this, is I think the proliferation of DoorDash, Uber, all that has changed parking situations downtown. You see a number of people now double parking because they're dashing in and out, and I would like this study to talk about 15-minute parking for a couple spots or various other options for looking at the Main Street corridor to how best to manage that parking situation in light of the economy that we have now with gig workers and all of that. So I do think that it's time for a refresh, just in light of how much the world has changed in these 14 years and everyone working from home, or a lot of people work from home now. I just think a lot has changed, and it's time to update that. So I'm supportive of this.

▶ 5:37:59 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. Next, we have Councilor Cal.

▶ 5:38:02 Speaker 12: So

▶ 5:38:05 Elizabeth Kowal: I think this is a very premature ask for a lot of the things that you actually just talked about. We haven't decided what's going to happen with the police station building. That could become parking. Nevertheless, if the police are going to move out, they take up a fair amount of spaces in that back parking lot. So that's going to free up more parking. So I think among other things, I think this request is actually quite premature because I think there are things that are going to happen in the next year or so that is going to free up more parking naturally downtown because of, again, whatever gets decided at the police station and the police actually moving out of there, and not taking up some of those spaces. So I've got an issue with that. I also, and I may be jumping into your comment- Go for it ... but I think part of the problem that we're hearing from merchants is that it's not so much a parking issue, it's an enforcement issue. So we have people who have these permits to park overnight, and they're supposed to be out by 8:00, and they're not out by 8:00, but they're not being ticketed either. So again, I think that's not a you issue, and I'm fully aware of that. But I think it's not necessarily that there's not an... I think again, there's a combination of issues here that could be addressed, that could alleviate some of what you're talking about or naturally will alleviate some of what you're talking about. So I think, and I've got other comments and I will keep, but I think it's a premature ask. We don't have enough data to support this.

▶ 5:39:35 Speaker 10: Next, I have Councilor Finocchiaro.

▶ 5:39:37 Cal Finocchiaro: Thank you. Yep. I'm going to echo what Councilor Cal said. The downtown area is my ward. I hear from merchants all the time, small businesses. They show up to work and the parking lots are full from the minute they get there in the morning, and they remain full, and there's no parking for people to go. And customers complain to them. So I think it is an enforcement. I think a lot of the people that are parking in these parking spaces are living in apartments and condos around that have permits, and they're supposed to leave at 8:00 a.m., and they're not. Because I highly doubt that downtown Melrose is that packed at 11:00 a.m. You know what I mean? Most people are working. It's these people that are sitting there, staying and parked. The other thing is, we are approving a lot of housing here that doesn't have ample parking. So people are parking, and they do have permits. Some people don't have permits, and I know we do ticket some people, but again, I think it's like we could solve the parking issue by actually enforcing the people that are abusing their overnight parking permits. And I see it. I'm downtown a lot, and it's like there's no way that all of these people behind Santa Fe that have been there since 8:00 a.m. are still shopping at 11:00. So, I find it hard to go along with this appropriation. So anyways, that's all I have to say.

▶ 5:41:12 Speaker 14: Yeah. If I could just respond to that. We are so fortunate to have the downtown that we have. We just had Studio Luce here for the police station and the Ripley School site, and they were just amazed at the form of our downtown, where we have the good width street and the shops that line that, and then the parking behind. But with that, you don't have those massive parking lots in the front of stores where you're always going to find a space right in front of where you want to go. And so you're always going to have that- Mm-hmm ... complaints about, "I can't find a space right where I want to park." The problem comes in where anecdotally you say, "Oh, that lot is full in the morning." But until you actually study that, you don't really understand what is going on. And so that's the point of this study is to understand, when you're hearing those complaints, what is the problem is if you're checking the license plates for those morning hours, and you have an understanding of, okay, yes, those are people that are living nearby that are parking there, and they're not moving their car until noon or whatever. So, that's exactly the point is to understand what's happening in the lots and to and then adjust the regulations around that. So

▶ 5:42:52 Cal Finocchiaro: I think that it's, like I said, and coming back to this, it's an enforcement situation. So I don't think we need to spend $30,000 on a parking study to tell the people that need to enforce it to enforce it, because I've made several phone calls, and I'm not calling anybody out, and they do a good job, but it's something that has to happen every day because then it's just repeat offenders. So I guess I'm saying it's like I don't even know how to solve it because what do you do once the parking study's done? You pass that paper over to whom and say, "Enforce it now"? It's kind of like I don't know how it's solved, but I don't know if a parking study is it. Yeah.

▶ 5:43:30 Speaker 10: Next, I have Councilor Kamchaidee.

▶ 5:43:32 Speaker 14: Oh

▶ 5:43:38 Manjula Karamcheti: my gosh, my brain. It's okay. I think I'm unaware that there's a significant parking issue in downtown Melrose. So I think I'm having a hard time making a connection between a significant problem that we've had, only because I've never had a constituent talk to me about the difficulty of parking in downtown Melrose. Granted, I am downtown, generally speaking, at 6:00 a.m., and I never have a problem, or on Saturdays at 8:00 a.m., and never have a problem. My son and my husband go to work out at the Y at noon. They've never had a problem. I've never had a constituent talk to me about problems parking in that area. And so I think the comment of

▶ 5:44:24 Manjula Karamcheti: most of the time when you go to park, it's not a problem, but when a lot of people are going to a big event in downtown, yes, it's very crowded. So I've heard more about complaints about parking in other places, like our smaller shopping areas, than in downtown. So I guess I just am struggling with making the connection of spending that amount of money to a problem nobody has discussed with me. That's all.

▶ 5:44:58 Kimberly Vandiver: Thank you. Before we go to Councilor Williams for the second time, I just wanted to ask what initiated this request. Was it something that merchants were asking for? Was there a specific trigger for why now to do the update?

▶ 5:45:14 Speaker 14: Just comments that we get from in the planning office, in the mayor's office.

▶ 5:45:21 Ryan Williams: Comments about lack of parking or comments about- Yes. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Next, we have Councilor Williams for the second time. Thanks. I wanted to lift up President Freeman point about Uber. We actually have a woman on the traffic commission who talks about this quite a bit. Her name's Kara Oberg, and she has pleaded with the city in her role as a traffic commissioner to create a curb management strategy. And she has often said to me all it would take is one vote of the traffic commission to designate a spot, temporary parking for delivery drop-off, enforce it, and you could do it for free in 15 minutes, or whatever it takes to get through a traffic commission meeting. I know I've done parking observations myself for the city in support of projects where I go down, and I just sit and watch people park and count- ... there's 15 cars here, and then I come back an hour later, and now there's 10 cars here, and I write it down and do the math. So I think this is one of those cases that I was talking about earlier where I really feel like we have some capacity to answer some of these questions ourselves, and I worry thatthis is sort of like a thing to say to people who complain about parking that we're going to take some action on it. But I fear that that action sort of takes us down a road that we don't want to go down, which is to massively overbuild the parking supply downtown, which leads to more cars downtown. You can't increase parking supply in the city without also bringing more cars into the city. So more traffic, more congestion at intersections. Anybody who's tried to drive down Foster behind Shaw's knows that you could be sitting there all day- Mm-hmm ... waiting for that. So I think that we need to do a little more thinking about how to position this and maybe try to cut the cost down.

▶ 5:47:11 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. Anybody else who'd like to comment?

▶ 5:47:14 Speaker 10: I don't believe we have a motion on the floor yet. I'm going to make a motion to reject.

▶ 5:47:21 Speaker 12: Second.

▶ 5:47:22 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. We have a motion to reject, Councilor Williams, and seconded by Councilor Finocchiaro. Anyone on discussion? Let's vote. So this is a point of order because we don't do this a lot. Sorry. I believe actually it's to send back with a recommendation to reject is what we're doing if we vote yes on this. Motion to not recommend or something.

▶ 5:47:43 Speaker 10: Yeah. We're sending back a recommendation to deny the- So if you vote yes on a recommendation to deny, you are denying the appropriation. If you vote no on a recommendation to deny, you are saying yes. Right. Regardless of how this comes out, when it goes to full council, we will vote again.

▶ 5:48:03 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah. It'll come up with one recommendation or another. So the vote is to deny. Voting yes is in favor of denying this request.

▶ 5:48:13 Speaker 10: Okay, let's vote. Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti?

▶ 5:48:25 Speaker 14: Yes.

▶ 5:48:27 Speaker 10: Councilor Kowal?

▶ 5:48:28 Speaker 12: Yes.

▶ 5:48:29 Speaker 10: Councilor Abremski? No. Councilor Park?

▶ 5:48:34 Speaker 14: Yes.

▶ 5:48:35 Speaker 10: Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? No.

▶ 5:48:41 Speaker 10: Councilor Romanul? Yes. Chair Vanderberg? No.